The Wychford Murders

by Paula Gosling

  Gregson swallowed, only too aware of how fast technology moved these days, and of how little time he had to keep up with it. ‘I don’t believe you,’ he said.

  Luke smiled. ‘Care to bet ten milligrams of your blood on it?’ he asked.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Kay had spent the afternoon cancelling and rearranging the evening appointments. She was deeply upset by David Gregson’s detainment by the police. She had worked with Gregson for five years now, and although she was fond of Jennifer, she had worked with her for less than one year.

  She glanced over at Jennifer, who was seated out of sight of the waiting room, behind the bank of filing cabinets that held patients’ records. Constable Bennett had come and gone with his notebook, working with Jennifer and Dr Mayberry, writing down everything they’d give him about the people on Abbott’s list. They didn’t answer all of the questions, only as many of them as they thought fit or relevant. Co-operation, not revelation. Even then, there were some conflicts and arguments between the two physicians – partly professional, partly personal. Now Bennett was gone, and Dr Wally had gone upstairs for another rest, looking drawn and exhausted.

  Kay, protective of the old man, felt Jennifer was to blame for this latest unfortunate development – and yet common sense told her that she was unfair to pass judgement. Certainly Jennifer looked as badly off as her uncle.

  Jennifer seemed to sense her disapproval, and looked up. ‘I had to do it, Kay. What if David is ill? Couldn’t help himself? If I said nothing, more women could die. I’d rather be wrong like this than that.’

  ‘I suppose so. But you could have talked to him first about it, couldn’t you?’

  ‘If he is the killer, he tried to kill me last night, remember? Would you want to accuse to his face someone who wanted you dead? I’m not that brave.’

  ‘Do you really, seriously, believe David Gregson wants you dead? Why, he’s half in love with you.’

  Jennifer shook her head. ‘What he feels for me isn’t love exactly, and it could even be hate. They’re very similar emotions. It’s indifference that’s opposite to love, not hate. I’ve been forced on him by Uncle Wally, and he resents that, he’s been badly let down and humiliated by his wife – I could see a reason there for him to detest women. Whether he’s made a leap into homicidal psychosis – who can say? I agree, it does seem far-fetched. But those knives . . . have you seen all those knives he keeps so damned sharp?’ She sighed. ‘I want everything to be the way it was before these killings began. I want to go on learning how to be a good family doctor, I want to build a life here, be of use, look after Uncle Wally and Aunt Clodie, come home again.’

  ‘What about Mark Peacock? He part of your nice life?’ Kay asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’ She ran a hand through her hair. ‘I feel absolutely rotten about Mark, as well as David.’

  ‘And Luke Abbott?’ Kay asked, pointedly.

  Jennifer looked across the office at her and managed a grin. ‘My God . . . it’s getting out of hand, isn’t it? It’s ridiculous. I mean, I’m divorced, approaching forty at about a hundred miles a minute, committed to a career – why should any of them be interested? Mark wants a châtelaine for his precious manor, David wants someone to bind his wounds and make him whole again, and Luke . . . ’ She paused.

  ‘Luke is different?’ Kay asked. ‘Or are you different where Luke is concerned?’

  ‘I don’t know. Luke . . . cares. It’s getting in the way of his investigation, it’s throwing him. Me, too.’ She looked at Kay in some bemusement. ‘I think Luke is wonderful,’ she said, simply. ‘And I think being a family doctor is wonderful, too. What do I do?’

  ‘Nothing, until you hear from me,’ Kay said, with a wry smile. ‘Is Luke Abbott asking for a decision?’

  ‘No, of course not. It hasn’t got that far. He may not want that, anyway. I might just be a – distraction, for old time’s sake.’

  Kay saw this possible explanation of Luke’s behaviour was haunting her. Still bruised from her divorce, Jennifer wasn’t ready to trust again. ‘Well, then – leave it alone,’ she advised. ‘See what develops. As you said, you’re not a dewy-eyed teenager, or even a fresh young thing. You’re an old bag, Jennifer. Face it. Old bags are allowed to take their time about making up their minds – what they have left of them.’ She glanced her wristwatch, and grimaced. ‘Doesn’t look like Dr Gregson’s coming back before dinner, does it? I’d better use the answering machine and refer night calls to Dr Calgary – Dr Wally called him earlier and asked if he’d stand in tonight. We did it before, when he first had his stroke and Dr Gregson was run off his feet before the locum could come in. Worked out all right.’

  Jennifer watched her as she put the message on the machine and connected it to the telephone. She felt listless and depressed. Kay clicked the last switch and let out a long, relieved breath. ‘Nearly time to go home and peel potatoes. We career women do have these fascinating demands on our time, don’t we?’

  ‘We do.’ Somehow, Jennifer managed a smile.

  With Kay gone the surgery seemed too quiet, too like a tomb. Jennifer went out to the kitchen and talked to Mrs Louis about dinner, then to the sitting room for a word with her aunt, back at her embroidery again. Then she went upstairs to face her uncle.

  ‘Be angry with me, Uncle Wally, not with Luke. It’s not fair, blaming him.’

  ‘Always was bull-headed, even as a boy,’ Uncle Wally grumbled, perversely, his eyes firmly on Robert Donat who was mouthing silently on the turned-down television set. ‘Fishing, studying, cricket – Luke Abbott always went his own way, wouldn’t listen to anyone. I suppose I should have seen he’d become something like a copper.’

  Jennifer sat on the edge of the bed and took one of his hands. ‘About David . . . ’

  ‘What about David?’ He scowled at her. ‘No more a murderer than I am. The whole idea’s ridiculous. What do you think he does, drink some potion in the silence of his lonely room, then dash out to slaughter the first female he comes across – just because he objects to you joining the practice? God save us, Jennifer, you don’t know him at all. Not at all.’ His eyes went back to the television set. ‘His wife’s a doctor, you know.’

  ‘Oh.’ Jennifer was taken aback. ‘I didn’t know.’

  ‘Well. There you are. She is. Consultant, dermatology, private practice only, over in Milchester. That’s how she met her precious baronet, by all accounts. Probably came to her with his semi-royal boils or something. And what has she up and done – just dropped her entire practice, that’s what she’s done. For “love”. Do you wonder David looks on female doctors with a wary eye? Must admit, I’m beginning to see things his way.’

  ‘You mean, you want me to leave the practice?’ Jennifer asked, dismayed.

  ‘No, I don’t want you to leave the practice,’ he said, mimicking her feminine tones. ‘But I can’t say I take kindly to your accusing your – our – partner of murder, either.’

  ‘Uncle Wally, somebody tried to kill me last night.’

  ‘Rubbish. And anyway, it wasn’t you who suffered, it was Frances. I can’t say I’ve ever taken kindly to her pushing me about the way she does, but she’s a good gel, I like her, she’s under my roof, and it was damned unfortunate. Don’t see why you have to make such a fuss. Don’t see any stitches in your face.’

  ‘Perhaps if there were you wouldn’t be so stubborn yourself,’ Jennifer said.

  ‘Nonsense,’ he said, but his voice was affectionate, despite his best intentions to remain stern. He loved Jennifer, but he was very fond of David, too, and he didn’t like this situation one little bit. Personal feelings aside, it was professionally damned difficult. ‘Naturally, I don’t want anything to happen to you. Least of all have you turn into a dried-up old maid. I’d hoped you and David would . . . get along.’

  ‘Yes, I know you did,’ she said, wryly.

&
nbsp; ‘Arid here you are, mooning after Luke Abbott instead.’

  ‘I’m not mooning after Luke Abbott!’

  ‘Then why this mother-lion act about my blaming him, hey? I can see what’s going on under my nose over a dinner table or a cup of tea. Cow-eyes, quick look, quick look away, pulses throbbin’ and all that. Lord, Jenny, I’ve had a stroke, not been struck blind and stupid. You were sweet on him as a girl, and you still are. But he’s a police officer now, not the captain of the cricket team or Lochinvar come out of the west. Only came from Milchester, for crying out loud. He’s got a job to do, and by God, he’ll do it. This turning David over to his not very tender mercies – why, it’s ridiculous, like some offering to a god. Look how clever I can be, Luke, look at me. A cat bringing home a mouse, looking for approval. You’ve let me down, girl. I’m cross with you. Turn up the TV and let me rest.’

  Jenny was enraged. She stood up. ‘Why, that’s not fair! That’s wicked, to think I’d be like that. David has all those sharp knives . . . ’

  ‘Always has had them – why should he turn to murdering now?’

  ‘One was gone from the case last night, put back this morning with a chip out of it. A chip about the size of the one I found in Frances’ wound . . . ’

  ‘Circumstantial . . . ’

  ‘And he keeps insisting that the killings are done by one person, as if asking to be caught . . . ’

  ‘Psychological flimflam . . . ’

  ‘And he has no alibis for the relevant nights . . . ’

  ‘He’s a hard-working GP . . . ’

  Jennifer’s guilt over what she had done, mixed with outrage and confusion, made a volatile mixture. Moreover, it had the odd characteristic of being able to strangle normal speech. All she could manage was a choked ‘Oh!’ before storming out of her uncle’s bedroom.

  He watched her go, relieved to be done with the scene he had been dreading, glad to be able to build up his strength for the inevitable scenes which lay ahead. David was bound to have a great deal to say about being ‘turned in’ like this, forced to waste time answering questions and defend himself when there was so much to do in the practice. Perhaps he’d even refuse to work with Jennifer again. That would make a pretty mess.

  Of course Luke would release David, there was no question about it. Even if the chip of metal did match the gap in the point of the bistoury, surely it could only mean that someone had stolen it and slipped it back? David was no killer. True, he’d been a little odd of late, but that was due to strain, and was quite understandable. Perhaps he’d even taken a pill or two to keep going, and then another to get to sleep. Many a doctor had done the same under stress – he’d done it himself, during the war. But that was no reason to worry.

  Absolutely not.

  Mind you, there were some damned odd pills about these days. And people did have adverse reactions, sometimes. And it was getting late, and David not back yet. But that was no reason to worry. He looked down at his hands.

  No reason to twist the coverlet up like that either.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  ‘PC Whitney has just phoned,’ Paddy said. He’d been summoned from the interrogation room, where they were questioning David Gregson, by an agitated PC Bennett. After talking to Whitney, Paddy had gone back and called Luke out. ‘Our man is there, right now. Hard at work, she says. Wants to know what we want her to do.’

  ‘Damn!’ Abbott glanced at the door of the interrogation room, where Gregson sat with a local officer from their investigative group. ‘He would pick tonight.’ He looked at Paddy. ‘Well, this is your baby. What do we want to do?’

  ‘I want him, Luke,’ Paddy said.

  ‘All right. Take Bennett and whoever you need. I’ll go on working on Gregson. And for God’s sake, be careful. No telling which way he’ll jump when you confront him. He has everything to lose.’

  ‘That’s why I want to take him,’ Paddy said, grimly.

  He went to Bennett and explained what he wanted, who he needed. The young officer never blinked an eye, but simply wrote it all down, and then did it. Paddy thought that if he did ever come down here, Bennett would be the one he’d want on his team. He might even want to move him over to Milchester, when he had the authority. They hadn’t had a chance to become acquainted, so he didn’t know the lad’s personal situation, but he recognised promotion material when he saw it. So did Abbott, who had already commented on his potential. One more good thing to come out of this rotten case. Who’d have believed it possible?

  When all was ready, they left in the unmarked lead car. The others would follow and be deployed around the parking lot if their target made a break for it. A lot of dark and rough country, still, around the plant, Paddy thought, as Bennett drove through the evening streets. Maybe it would have been better to let Luke do this – he knew the land. But it was Paddy’s chance to show his colours, and they both knew it.

  Had to go right, first time. Had to.

  Bennett parked the car across the front entrance to the photo-processing plant, and the other cars following spaced themselves around the perimeter, the men stationing themselves in between. It was fully dark now, but the moon was rising. They moved in silence, with only an occasional low mutter into a lapel radio.

  Paddy and Bennett glanced at one another. Paddy nodded, and they went in through the main entrance. The reception area was only faintly lit. They could hear the voices and laughter of the cleaning women in the plant itself, mops cracking against the bases of machines, the hum of a floor polisher. There was movement in the shadows, and PC Whitney, a trim, pert-faced blonde in loose clothes and a wraparound coverall, emerged.

  ‘Upstairs, sir,’ she said to Paddy. ‘In the small laboratory where they do special orders. He’s alone. There’s only two doors, both open on to hallways. I’ll show you.’

  ‘He’s actually processing negatives?’ Paddy asked.

  ‘Yes, sir. Or he was when I left to call you. He’s still there, his car hasn’t left the lot.’

  ‘Good girl. Come on.’

  They went up the stairs, listening in case he took the lift down, but there was no sound from the mechanism. The upper hall ran from a small foyer down a long, unlit hall which went around a corner at the far end. Halfway down, a square of light spilled out of windows set high in double doors.

  ‘That’s the Special Projects lab,’ Whitney whispered. ‘If you go around the hall at the end, you’ll see the other door – just a fire exit, really.’

  ‘Bennett?’ Paddy said. Bennett nodded and moved off.

  They waited for a moment for Bennett to take up his position, then Paddy pushed the door open and entered the lab.

  ‘Working late, are we?’ he asked, in a loud voice, meant to startle and unnerve. The man bent over the lab table jerked upright and dropped the photograph he’d been holding. It caught a draught and skidded away from him. He made an automatic lunge for it, but it eluded him.

  Bennett, coming in the other door, picked it up, looked at it, and scowled. He came across and handed it to Paddy. ‘Lousy composition,’ he said.

  Paddy looked at it and his jaw clenched. ‘This isn’t very nice, Mr Grimes,’ he said. ‘Not at all the sort of thing one puts on the wall of one’s office, is it? Wouldn’t go down too well with the rest of the jolly old chaps, would it?’

  ‘Oh, my God,’ Grimes moaned. ‘You weren’t supposed to be on tonight,’ he said to PC Whitney, accusingly, as if it were all her fault.

  ‘Volunteer work,’ PC Whitney said, grimly. She had seen the photograph, too. ‘I have a generous heart.’

  ‘Is this what Beryl Tompkins discovered, Mr Grimes?’ Paddy asked. ‘Did she accuse you, say she was going to the police about you and this filthy stuff? She had children of her own, Mr Grimes, she didn’t take kindly to this kind of thing, did she?’

  ‘You don’t understand,’ Grimes said, weak
ly, his smooth face suddenly pale and overlaid with an oily sheen of perspiration. ‘I love children. These are only art studies . . . ’

  ‘Come off it, Mr Grimes. This is paedophilic pornography under any definition of the act, and you are guilty of causing it to be sent through the mails to others of your kind. You’ve used the equipment here, without permission . . . ’

  ‘I had permission,’ Grimes said, drawing himself up.

  ‘Not for this kind of thing,’ Paddy said. ‘I checked.’

  ‘You’ve talked to . . . ’

  ‘I’ve checked,’ Paddy said, again. ‘I repeat, is this what Beryl Tompkins discovered, Mr Grimes? Discovered the night she was killed? Is that why she left before her work was finished, telling the others she had a “headache”? Ran to catch the earlier bus? But it didn’t do any good, did it? You anticipated her, you waited by the bush. We checked your army record, Mr Grimes. You were in the photographic section only in the beginning of the war. You were transferred, trained in commando techniques, and sent behind the lines to photograph Nazi military installations. That kind of training doesn’t go, does it? Faced with discovery, you did what you were trained to do – kill silently and run. You’re finished, Grimes.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Grimes protested, his voice shrill.

  ‘Then we’d better go somewhere and discuss it, hadn’t we?’ Paddy suggested. ‘Whitney, go downstairs and get a couple of the men up here to gather up this filth as evidence.’

  ‘I’ll do it, sir,’ Whitney said, in a calm voice. ‘I have a strong stomach – and I didn’t have any dinner tonight.’

  Abbott emerged from the interrogation room when he heard the protesting tones of Grimes coming down the hall. The ride to the station had given the Personnel Manager a chance to gather his wits, and he was demanding a solicitor, justice, understanding, his wife not to be told, a cup of tea, and anything else he could think of.